TELKOMNIKA, Vol.11, No.11, November 2013, pp.

6329~6336
e-ISSN: 2087-278X
6329

Received April 22, 2013; Revised June 24, 2013; Accepted July 6, 2013
Study on Control Strategies for the Multilevel Cascaded
Converters


Lin Xu*
1
, Yang Han
2

1
Sichuan Electric Power Research Institute, No.24, Qinghua Road, Qingyang District, 610072 Chengdu,
China
2
University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, No.2006, Xiyuan Road, West High-Tech Zone,
Chengdu, 611731, Chengdu, China
*Corresponding author, e-mail: xulin198431@hotmail.com


Abstract
The multilevel cascaded converters are extensively applied for high-voltage and high-power
applications, which are considered as the most favorable topologies for the high power ac-drives and the
high-voltage DC transmission (HVDC) systems using the voltage source converters (VSCs). This paper
presents the dc capacitor balancing and effective current regulation methodologies for the multilevel
cascaded converters. The dc-link voltage balancing and capacitor energy evolving mechanism of the
MMCC is analyzed, and an effective control scheme is devised by utilizing two dc capacitor voltage control
loops, including the total capacitor voltage controller (TCVC), the capacitor voltage balancing controller
(CVBC). The predictive current controller is proposed to enhance the tracking accuracy of current control
loop. The proportional-resonant controller (PRC) is used as circulating current damping controller of the
modular multilevel converter, which is found to be highly effective to minimize the circulating current. The
Electromagnetic Transient Program (EMTP) is utilized for digital simulation of the single-phase five-level
modular multilevel converter. The effectiveness of the control scheme is validated by the simulation
results.

Keywords: multilevel converter, predictive current control, Dc-link control, EMTP

Copyright 2013 Universitas Ahmad Dahlan. All rights reserved.


1. Introduction
Multilevel voltage-source converters (VSCs) allow a significant reduction of the
harmonic content of the output voltage as compared to the traditional two-level VSCs [1].
Among various multilevel topologies [2], the fairly recently proposed modular multilevel cascade
converter (MMCC) [3] has many attractive properties. As the name suggests, the topology is
modular and easily scalable in terms of voltage levels. It consists of N identical series-
connected sub-modules per arm, which brings flexibility to the circuit design, and results in low-
voltage steps [4, 5].
In high-voltage applications, N may be as high as several hundred, which is ideal choice
for high-voltage high-power applications, such as high-voltage dc transmission (HVDC), high-
power motor drives, and electric railway supplies [5-8]. The grid-connected MMCC may act as a
rectifier, an inverter, an inductor, and a capacitor, depending on the phase difference between
the supply voltage and current. This implies that the MMCC is required to achieve rigid and
stable voltage control of all the floating dc capacitors under all operating conditions.
This paper presents the dc-link capacitor balancing and effective current regulation
methodologies for the MMCC. The organization of this paper is as follows. Section 2 presents
the system description of the MMCC system, including the modeling and analysis of the MMCC.
Section 3 presents the control strategies of the MMCC, including the sum capacitor voltage
controller (SCVC), the difference capacitor voltage controller (DCVC), the predictive current loop
controller (PCC) and the circulating current damping controller (CCDC). Section 4 presents the
simulation results. And section 5 concludes this paper.




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2. Mathematical Modeling for Modular Multilevel Converter
Figure 1 shows the circuit diagram of the single-phase modular multilevel cascaded
converter (MMCC). To derive the mathematical model of the MMC converter, let us consider a
generic converter with N sub-modules per arm, each arm is controlled with the modulation index
m(t), where m(t)=0 means that all sub-modules in the arm are by-passed, and m(t)=1 denotes
all the sub-modules in the arm are inserted. The ideal capacitance of the arm is denoted as:

,
/
u d dc
C C N = (1)



Figure 1. Circuit Diagram of the Single-phase MMCC Topology


Where C
u,d
denotes the capacitance of each chopper cell. Therefore, the following equations
hold for the upper and lower leg currents:

,
( )
( ) ( )
dc u
u u
u
d u t
m t i t
dt C
=

(2)

,
( )
( ) ( )
dc d
d d
d
d u t
m t i t
dt C
=

(3)

Where m
u
(t) and m
d
(t), u
dc,u
(t) and u
dc,d
(t), i
u
(t) and i
d
(t) denote the modulation index, the
capacitor voltages and currents of the upper and lower arm, respectively.
Referring to Figure 1, when only the single-phase leg is considered, the relations
among i
u
, i
d
and the circulating current i
z0
can be derived as:
0
2
u d
z
i i
i
+
=
0
2
L
u z
i
i i = +
0
2
L
d z
i
i i = + (4)

Hence, the load current is represented as:

L u d
i i i = (5)

From Figure 1, according to the Kirchhoffs Voltage Law (KVL):

,
2
d u
e u e u dc u v
V di
R i L m u u
dt
=

(6)

,
2
d d
e d e d dc d v
V di
R i L m u u
dt
+ + + =

(7)
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Study on Control Strategies for the Multilevel Cascaded Converters (Lin Xu)
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Where u
v
denotes the voltage at the center of the converter leg, and R
e
and L
e
denote the
effective series resistance and buffer inductance for each arm.
From Equation (6) and Equation (7), we get:

, ,
0
0 0
2 2
u dc u d dc d
z d
z e z e
m u m u
di V
u R i L
dt
+
= + =

(8)

, ,
2 2 2
u dc u d dc d
e e L
v L
m u m u
R L di
u i
dt

=

(9)

Where u
z0
denotes the voltage drop across the R
e
and L
e
due to the circulating current i
z0
. From
Equation (8) and Equation (9), we get:

, ,
[ ( ) ( )]
( )
dc u dc d
u u d d
dc
d u t u t
N
m i m i
dt C
+
= +

(10)

, ,
[ ( ) ( )]
( )
dc u dc d
u u d d
dc
d u t u t
N
m i m i
dt C

=

(11)

The modulation index m
u
and m
d
can be denoted as:

0
1
2
v z
u
d
u u
m
V
+
= ,
0
1
2
v z
d
d
u u
m
V

= + (12)

Let:

, ,
( ) ( ) ( )
dc u dc d dc
u t u t u t + =

(13)

, ,
( ) ( ) ( )
dc u dc d dc
u t u t u t = A

(14)

Substituting Equation (12)-(14) into Equation (9)-(10), we get:

0
0
( ) 2
[ (1 ) ]
dc v L z
z
dc d d
d u t u i u N
i
dt C V V
= +

(15)


0 0
( ) 2 1
[( ) ]
2
dc z v z
L
dc d d
d u t u u i N
i
dt C V V
A
= (16)
From Equation (8), we get:

, ,
0
0
2 2
u dc u d dc d
z d
e e z
m u m u
di V
L R i
dt
+
=

(17)

The second term can be denoted as:

0
, ,
1 1
( ) ( ) ( ) ( )
2 4 2
z v
u dc u d dc d dc dc
d d
u u
m u m u u t u t
V V
+ = A

(18)

Hence, Equation (17) can be rewritten as:

0 0
0
1
( ) ( ) ( )
2 4 2
z d z v e
dc dc z
e e d e d e e
di V u u R
u t u t i
dt L L V L V L L
= A

(19)

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Notably, the MMCC system dynamics can be described by Equation (15)-(19), and the
theoretical steady state point can be derived. However, since the coefficients in these
differential equations are time-varying, the analytical solution would not be directly obtained.
Whereas, the approximated steady state solution of i
z0
can be derived from Equation (19) by
assuming the u
z0
is small compared with V
d
, thus we get:

0
v L
z
d
u i
i
V
= (20)

Substituting Equation (20) to Equation (16), the u
z0
is derived as:

2
0
2
2
d v
z
d
V u
u
V
=
(21)

The output voltage u
v
can be approximated as:

sin( )
v m
u V t e = (22)

In case of active rectifier mode, i
L
can be approximated as:

sin( )
L m
i I t e = (23)

Hence, i
z0
can be derived as:

0
(1 cos(2 ))
2
m m
z
d
V I
i t
V
e =
(24)

And u
z0
is rewritten as:

2
0
(1 cos(2 ))
2
d m
z
d
V V
u t
V
e =
(25)

In case of reactive power generation mode, i
L
is denoted as:

sin( 90 )
L m
i I t e = (26)

Hence, i
z0
can be derived as:

0
sin(2 )
2
m m
z
d
V I
i t
V
e =
(27)
It can be observed from Equation (24)-(27) that, in either active rectifier or reactive
compensation mode, i
z0
contains a second order oscillation term, which causes unnecessary
circulating currents and power loss across the converter arms. This effect can be minimized by
using damping controller based on the circulating current damping controller (CCDC).


3. Control Strategies of the Modular Multilevel Converter
The control strategy implemented is a linear control which aims to operate MMC in the
proximity of the linear region. Two different voltage control loops are implemented, namely, the
total capacitor voltage controller (TCVC) and the capacitor voltage balancing controller (CVBC),
the TCVC block is used to control the overall energy of the leg, and the CVBC block is used to
control the balance between upper and lower arms of the MMCC phase-leg. Notably, due to the
non-linear system equations, the interaction between the TCVC and CVBC loops may lead to
instability. However, since total energy and energy balance interacts dynamically, the TCVC
loop is tuned to be about ten percent of the CVBC loop to achieve the decoupled control.
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3.1. Total Capacitor Voltage Controller
The total capacitor voltage controller (TCVC) is used to regulate the total energy stored
in a MMC converter leg. Typically, in a steady state operation, the reference value is set to 2V
d
.
It has been found that the proportional controller k
p,sum
is sufficient to regulate the sum capacitor
voltage to its reference. By adding an integration term, the TCVC control is also effective, but
the parameter selection is crucial to ensure global stability under a wide operation range. For
the sake of simplicity, the proportional control is a good tradeoff between the accuracy and
robustness.

3.2. Capacitor Voltage Balancing Controller
Referring to Equation (16), the term i
L
is not producing any average value since it is an
AC component in steady state. The term also -2i
z0
u
v
/V
d
contributes only by an oscillating term, if
i
z0
does not have any component with the same frequency as u
v
. The only quantity that can be
freely varied without causing deviations from u
v
reference is i
z0
. Therefore, the only way to
influence the energy balance between the two arms is to regulate the circulating current i
z0
. A
separate proportional controller k
p,diff
is utilized to regulate the difference capacitor voltage to its
reference (zero).

3.3. Predictive Current Controller (PCC)
Current control of the MMCC can be made with high bandwidth, which is crucial for
reduction of transient currents during faults, and reduction of current harmonics. Both the output
current i
L
and circulating current i
z0
are available for feedback control. The differential equation
across the grid impedance is described as:

1
[ ]
L L
L v g
di r
i u v
dt L L
= + (28)

Where L and r
L
denotes the grid coupling inductance and its equivalent resistance. Let
v(t)=u
v
(t)v
g
(t), the following equation can be derived:

0
0
( ) ( )
0
1
( ) ( ) ( )
L L
r r
t t t t
L L
L L
t
i t e i t e v d
L
t
t t

= +
}
(29)

Notably, the control loop of the MMCC belongs to the typical sample-data control
system. Let t
0
=kT
s
, t=(k+1)T
s
, the discrete representation of Equation (29) is derived as:

[( 1) ] ( 1)
1
( 1) ( ) ( )
L L
s s s
s
r r
T k T k T
L L
L L
kT
i k e i k e v d
L
t
t t
+ +
+ = +
}
(30)
Since r
L
is very small, hence we get
[( 1) ]
1
L
s
r
k T
L
e
t +
~ , thus the following equation can be
obtained:

( 1)
1
( 1) ( ) [ ( ) ( )]
L
s s
s
r
T k T
L
L L v g
kT
i k e i k u v d
L
t t t
+
+ = +
}
(31)

In order to derive the predictive current control, the reference current for i
L
(t) at the kth
sampling instant is represented as i
ref
(k)=i
L
(k+2), thus the MMCC output voltage u
v
is derived as:

/
( ) [ ( ) ( 1)] ( 1)
L s m
r T L m
v ref L g
s
L
u k i k e i k v k
T

= + + + (32)

From Equation (32), it can be deduced that, in order to calculate the MMCC output
voltage u
v
(k), it is necessary to predict the values i
L
(k+1) and the average value of v
g
(k+1). By
using the interpolation method, the relations among the consecutive three sampling points of
grid voltages are derived as:
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( 2) 2 ( 1) ( )
g g g
v k v k v k + = + (33)

Thus, the last term in Equation (32) is denoted as:

1 5 3
( 1) [ ( 1) ( 2)] ( ) ( 1)
2 2 2
g g g g g
v k v k v k v k v k + = + + + =
(34)

In order to predict i
L
(k+1), the variable L in Eq.(31) is replaced by its nominal value L
m
,
thus:
( 1) ( ) [ ( 1) ( )]
L
s
m
r
T
L s
L L v g
m
T
i k e i k u k v k
L

+ = + (35)

Therefore, the block diagram of the predictive current control law is derived as shown in
Figure 2.




Figure 2. The Block Diagram of the Predictive Current Control Law


From the block diagram, the open-loop transfer function of the current controller H(z) is
obtained as:

1
( )
( 1)( 1)
m
L
H z
L z z
=
+
(36)

The closed-loop characteristic equation is 1+H(z)=0, hence we get:

2
2
( 1)
0
( 1)
m
L L z
L z
+
=

(37)
Therefore, the poles are represented as:

( )
m
z L L L = (38)

From Equation (38), it can be observed that, in case of L=L
m
, we get z
2
=0, indicating
that the MMCC output current tracks the reference signal in two cycles.

3.4. Circulating Current Damping Controller (CCDC)
The proportional-integral regulator shows unsatisfactory performance for current
tracking in case of alternating reference signal, which results in remarkable phase and
amplitude tracking errors. The proportional resonant (PR) current controller, on the other hand,
achieves excellent tracking performance for the alternating signal, which mimics the PI regulator
implemented in the synchronous rotating reference frame (SRRF) with the following transfer
function:
TELKOMNIKA e-ISSN: 2087-278X

Study on Control Strategies for the Multilevel Cascaded Converters (Lin Xu)
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, 0
, 0
2 2
( )
i z
PR p z
n
k
G s k
s e
= +
+
(39)

Where the parameters k
p,z0
and k
i,z0
are proportional and resonant gain, and
n
denotes the
angular frequency of the target alternating signal, which implies the second order harmonic in
the present case. Thanks to the infinite open-loop gain introduced by the PR regulator, the zero
steady-state tracking error is realized for the alternating signal at 100Hz.


4. Simulation Results and Discussions
To validate the effectiveness of the control strategies, the digital simulation of the
single-phase five-level MMCC converter is carried out using the Electromagnetic Transient
Program (EMTP-ATP). The system parameters are: the buffer inductance and resistance
L
e
=4.5mH, R
e
=0.02Ohm, V
d
=800V, the dc-link capacitor value C
dc
=2.5mF, the grid inductance
L
s
=1.5mH, V
grid
=220V (RMS), the capacitor reference dc-link voltage V
dc,ref
=400V, the TCVC
controller gain k
p,sum
=12, the CVBC controller gain k
p,diff
=1.2, the circulating current damping
controller (CCDC) gain k
p,z0
=1.5, k
i,z0
=200.




Figure 3. The Simulation Results of the MMCC under Active Rectifier Mode
(a) without and (b) with circulating current damping controller.


Figure 3 shows the simulation results of the MMCC under active rectifier mode. And the
grid voltage undergoes outages during t=0.1s and t=0.2s. The dc-link capacitor voltages
u
dc1
~u
dc4
, the load current i
L
, the load voltage v
Load
, the grid voltage v
g
, and the circulating
current i
z0
can be observed. In Figure 3, the peak active current reference i
L,ref
=50A, it can be
observed in Figure 3(a) that the dc-link capacitor voltages are stable both in steady state and
transient process, and the circulating current i
z0
shows obvious second order oscillation with
positive dc offset without the circulating current controller. However, when the circulating current
controller is activated, the second order component is eliminated, as shown in Figure 3(b).


5. Conclusion
The dc capacitor balancing and effective current regulation methodologies for the
modular multilevel cascaded converter (MMCC) are proposed in this paper. Based on the
capacitor energy evolving mechanism, an effective capacitor control scheme is devised, which
e-ISSN: 2087-278X
TELKOMNIKA Vol. 11, No. 11, November 2013: 6329 6336
6336
includes the total capacitor voltage controller (TCVC) and capacitor voltage balancing controller
(CVBC). To enhance the tracking accuracy of current control loop, the predictive current
controller (PCC) is presented. To minimize the circulating current of the MMCC, an effective
circulating current damping controller (CCDC) is proposed using proportional-resonant
controller. The simulation results under active rectifier mode are presented for verification, which
shows perfect capacitor voltage balancing control and precise current tracking.


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